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this post was submitted on 04 Jan 2024
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I would inclined to think yes, since there is no advantage in this case for trans-women athletes.
The issue at present is trans women are barred, regardless of whether they have gone through male puberty or not from sports that statistically favor female phenotype over male or are so culturally different as to be a unique sport. Even social category gender delineation leagues designed to cater to removing misogyny from sport such as fishing or chess. The issue deepens with many categories requiring cis women to be tested for and artificially reduce the naturally occurring testosterone in their system through medications and endure invasive scrutiny medically to ensure they have no intersex characteristics.
A lot of the issue becomes that when we talk about trans women in sport there is zero tolerance atmosphere that bleeds over any kind of boundary. There is so very rarely a discussion that actually weighs the harms done to cis women and intersex people by the level of hostility sport has towards specifically trans women. In many instances it becomes the socially acceptable kernel of transphobia that people use to not-so-covertly express their veiw of trans women being a threat to womens spaces.
When you turn to the aspects of how restrictions that are proposed in sport that does favor male phenotypic physique you find an interesting double bind. Sport that forces athletes under 18 to compete in the category of their birth sex means that if you have a trans girl who is on blockers and then transitioning at 16 you basically remove them from being competitive in the early days of their sport and thus they can be sifted out of sport entirely by not meeting a lot of the criteria of recruiters or trainers for being good candidates for training and attention. You essentially create an issue where a person who goes through female puberty is placed in a situation where their only means of competing is against an entire roster of those who have gone through male puberty.
Or if speaking on trans men in this exact situation you get an opposite problem. If you are seen as having an unfair advantage and none of your accomplishments are likely to be taken seriously.
Being segregated by birth sex also creates a hostile situation for trans people's mental health generally as one is placed in a situation that constantly reinforces that society veiws you as indelibly your birth sex and with transness there exists a level of alienation you feel towards other members of your birth sex that means that you do not form bonds with them as being "alike". Mentally at least it creates a similar situation that feels similar to when you are the only member of your sex in a room filled with the opposite sex. This is commonly a major obstacle to cis women in male dominated hobbies and vice versa. This alienation means within the sport you have to have an incredible fortitude for going it alone even if you do not encounter trans misogyny and bullying.
While a stipulation of 'under 18 sex segregation' sounds fair to cis people to trans people who understand what being trans actually is like it represents essentially a trick that preys on the lack of understanding and effective empathy cis people have about the barriers that exist for trans people. It creates circumstances that create insurmountable mental and physical obstacles designed to create odds where it is likely the sport will never have a trans candidate overcome the barriers to be a state to qualify while still theoretically being "inclusive". Since an "open" category of the sport generally doesn't exist this essentially means that there is an entire aspect of society that no form of reasonable accommodation is made to allow participation. Literally people with physical disabilities have more competition league sports altered to accommodate their needs then there exists any sport options open to trans and intersex athletes which, provided you care, represents a civil rights issue towards fair accommodation to participate in society.
This is very good write up and shows complexity of the issue. I actually learned couple of things here, thank you. It is unfortunate that quite often pro-trans right community does not recognize the complexity and have an attitude that trans-women are women and always should be allowed into women sports, without recognizing that it is not that simple and often discussions of those details are just shut down.
It is understandable. A lot of people want to show their support but may not have the best understanding of exactly what trans folk are up against. Similarly a lot of the anti-trans rhetoric tends to paint things very broadly and tends to make the conversation entirely about physical attributes and not about the actual role sports play more widely in the web of personal human connection.
Within the trans community sports are one of those things that people can get kind of wistful about because you are either someone who doesn't give a damn about sports but the topic is frequently used as a "gotcha" to frame you personally as a societal problem of classification that will never be solved... Or sports is something that once brought you joy and you labor in vain to overcome the barriers. It becomes one more thing you had to give up participation in, often even in amateur spaces where it's done just for fun and exercise. When other barriers to being openly trans include issues with retaining connection with family/friends and freedom of travel issues of being severed from previously valuable social connections become compounded.
Children are often encouraged to pursue and enjoy some sort of physical activity from a young age, often before there's any reason to segregate the sexes. A lot of parents are keen to go over the top in their support because they know there is a fair amount of potential leg up from disadvantaged classes to be had in the realm of sport scholarship to post secondary. Even a lot of purely acedemic University portfolios are benefited by participating in some sort of extracurricular sport so it cannot be said that giving it all up doesn't present some actual hardship to young trans people more generally.
Trans voices are very often lost in these discussions which sucks because it's nessisary to know more than just the basics to give proper context. In our absence there's a lot of stuff that is designed to seem perfectly reasonable but is actually designed to be purposefully exclusionary because we as a group are not well understood by the general public. Often even our nearest and dearest struggle to empathize. It's easier to just list all the problems we present rather than actually talk about potential solutions.
What is your take about sports that traditionally favor women or have very specific differences in form?
An example of the former for instance being long distance swiming which is traditionally female dominated.
The former would be something like Women's gymnastics which is so different from Mens Gymnastics they are essentially entirely different sports where even elite mens gymnasts cannot easily perform the sport because it requires an entirely separate training program.
If being trans-women does not provide advantages, I have no objections whatsoever for trans-women participation, and would actually argue that this is the right thing to do. For the same reason I see no problem of trans-men participating in men's sports.